Thanks to everyone who generously offered their advice. I think I know which advice was good..and which wasn't. I appreciate the responses and I learned alot about Prop firms. This thread was a success for me. Thanks.
Quote from DHOHHI: So you agree AZO is not a high volume stock yet you "only" trade high volume, high liquid stocks. --------------------------------------------------- Yes. Which part of this confuses you? Oh I forgot, this is ET, where the angry roam. As Michael Jackson said, "Beat it". -------------------------------------------------- Let's tray again. You said you ONLY trade stocks that are high volume and highly liquid. Yet you acknowledge AZO doesn't meet those criteria. Which part confuses you? It is you who wrote the above. Quote from DHOHHI: I'd bet there's nothing in your trading methodology that's unique or new. -------------------------------------------------- You bet wrong. Now please take your anger and frustration elsewhere dude. ------------------------------------------------- Like I said earlier --- you let us know what hedge fund adopts your strategy and partners with you. Plenty of quants who have delved into optimizing trading high volume/high liquid stocks. I've been trading 14 years as a full time endeavor and have seen noobies come and go. Your sheer volume, or lack thereof, says a lot about your account size.
OK i'll move my lips slowly this time. AZO is one of 200 stocks I follow. I've traded about 50 of those 200 stocks this year. I have traded AZO this year. AZO traded about a million shares today and is priced around $150. That's exactly the type of stock I am referring to here on page #6 when asked: Please take your anger and frustration elsewhere. You are embarrassing yourself.
you are revealing yourself by taking it personal. bush moved his lips slowly and lost the election. bottom line your numbers don't add up. "interest" in you from hedge funds does not make an offer but perhaps politeness perhaps offer to pay a desk fee together with 50/50 split.
Trading a few hundred shares of stocks above $50 is very different from trading several thousand shares of these same stocks. The fills are very different and the emotional component of dealing with the P&L swings can be unnerving. Your strategy is not necessarily scalable. I don't think a prop firm can take you seriously if your average recent trading volume is 3000 shares. It doesn't show that you're actually trading, just putting on a few positions here and there.
I'm just reading what was written in these posts but something really doesn't make sense to me. Over the last 15 years you were profitable but you only trade 3k shares a day? That means that over the past 15 years you've never sized up? When I started many years ago I traded 200 share lots and did about 5K shares a day, by the end of year one I was trading 5k to 10K positions of the exact types of stocks you're talking about. I'm hard pressed to understand why after 15 years you are trading 200 share lots of stocks like CAT, IBM or whatever other popular stocks you're involved in that are over 50 bucks. Are you forgetting to mention that you hold overnights or that you're an Investor and not a day trader? That's the only thing I can think of to explain what you're saying. If I'm missing something please let me know, it's just that what you're saying strikes me as being strange. When I started I couldn't wait to size up and make more money, I think all traders look forward to that. But you're saying that you've been trading the exact same size for 15 years. I don't doubt that you're telling the truth about your record, I feel that if what you're saying is true that you are not confident enough to really trade these strategies yourself or you don't have the stomach for it. I'm probably the strongest advocate of trading Prop over your own money on this website. I started with only prop trading and did that for about a decade only to later move onto trading my own money currently. I would never have been able to achieve the level of success I had trading my own money b/c I simply didn't have enough to get started. However, after I made enough to comfortably trade on my own with the size I had grown accustomed to, I went on to simply open my own 4 to 1 account b/c it's my firm belief that until a trader can trade their own money effectively on that low of a margin they have no business trading their own money. You however have 5 million dollars in trading profits over the last 15 years, so I don't understand why you wouldn't put up 100k and just trade with 400k bp which should be more than enough for any 100 dollar stock you want to trade 200 shares of. I also would like to understand how in the world you made 5 million dollars trading 200 shares of LIQUID big caps. Unless you were trading berkshire all day I just can't comprehend how you earned 5 million dollars. Please correct me if I'm wrong on any of this.
Yes. I'm actually surprised you asre saying this given our dialogue. Where did I ever say I trade 200 share lots? Where did I say I never sized up? I'm not sure where you came up with "trade 200 share lots", but you are mistaken. This thread is 10 pages. Please find where you think I said this and provide the link. Thank you! Again, I never said I traded 200 share lots. I did say when i'm rolling I can do 50K shares a day. I did say recently i've been defensive and trade about 3K a day on average. Again, please post the link to where I specifically described the size of my trades. Thanks! I never said this either. I have no idea where you got this from. Please provide the link. Thank you.
Again, I never said I trade a few hundred shares of anything. My minimum trade size is 1,000 shares. I have said, on average recently I have been defensive and have only traded about 3K shares a day. This would entail a position of 1,000 maybe 1,500 maybe 2,000 shares where I enter and exit once. I have also said when i'm rolling I can trade up to 50K shares a day. You could not be more wrong on this point but you are entitled to your opinion. Thank you.
Like I said in a previous post, I thank everyone for their help. There is no need to speculate as to the specifics of what I do. Everything I said is true--and obviously I needed to be honest because I wanted honest answers about Prop firms. I now have a general understanding of Prop firms, and so this thread has helped me, but now it has also run its course. I thank everyone for helping me learn.